Story:Kings of Strife/Part 21
Part Twenty-One When he regained consciousness, Vik’s back lay on sand once again. He was sure that he had only been asleep for mere seconds from a combination of exhaustion, terror, and shock at what the Lance Knight had done at the summit of the Mirage Tower; but then again, the last time he had fallen asleep in such a way, Vik had rested for hours within the desert without being the wiser. Regardless, Vik sat up with his body still aching in every possible area, though his forehead wound had dried and caked itself shut in the time since he acquired it. The sun was low in the sky, likely at a time of mid evening; dark clouds pregnant with storm and tempest still gathered all around the air, giving the day an aesthetic of moody darkness; and no matter what direction Vik looked in, he could not see the Mirage Tower anywhere around him. He could not decide if the Tower had simply vanished or if he had been brought out of by the Lance Knight. That such an act could have been committed by the same entity that had tried vigorously to kill him, themselves a part of the very same group that had singlehandedly ruined his life, was enough to shock Vik senseless. Senseless, senseless, this whole thing is just so senseless!” he yelled aloud, pulling up fist-sized clumps of sand only to throw them about, raging and convulsing furiously. “Is this some sort of sadistic joke? Do they leave me alive solely to further torture me at a later time? Why is this happening to me – could it be because I have been Chosen? Who or what chose me, and with what authority do they think they can whip me around? What divine being dares imagine me as their plaything?!” He was on his knees, despairingly ripping at the tiny rags that comprised of his shirt, when Vik heard what sounded like an engine. “This must be my final illusion,” he whispered through cracked lips. “What engine could be rushing towards me but the carriage of the devil? I am going to die here, unrealized, unfulfilled. Rosaria, my friends, forgive me…” With hands covered in grains of sand, he rubbed at his eyes, irritating them and drawing forth tears. Before he laid his head down to accept his death, Vik looked up through his tears and recognized the figure on the engine that drove right towards him. Without reason or logic, despite the fact that he was trapped in the middle of the world’s largest desert, Vik saw that Crono Silverius was riding right towards him. Vik squinted and rubbed away his tears, but this only magnified the irritation of his eyes, and his efforts did not improve once a cloud of dust and sand landed over Vik in the midst of Silverius’ arrival. “I can’t believe I found you,” the familiar voice mentioned, amazed, as Vik coughed and struggled to regain his bearings. “It can’t be,” Vik wheezed. “Silverius? You’re alive?” “I should be saying the same thing to you! I never thought you’d actually make it through being in this hell for so long. I’ve been searching in and out of this place for, what, a week?” The mercenary hopped off his bike and grabbed hold of Vik’s shoulder, forcefully pulling him to his feet and using his other hand to wipe the dust off the Nneonian’s face. Silverius wore an outfit suitable for long stretches of time in the desert, with baggy gray pants, a navy blue oversized shirt and matching boots, as well as a torn olive green robe over his head and shoulders. “Were you attacked by a wild animal or something? You look awful. Are you okay?” As he inspected Vik’s tanned and bruised body, Silverius pulled off his green robe and draped it over Vik’s shoulders. “Worse. I found the Crystal, and I fought a Serpent Knight.” Silverius froze. By now, Vik had cleared his eyes of the dirt within them and could see again. As he looked around, he was able to once again confirm that the Tower was nowhere to be found, as well as the fact that Silverius was alone. “Where is Cidolas, and that girl you were supposed to go rescue? The third Hero?” Silverius’ countenance visibly darkened and he let go Vik’s shoulder. “Gone, all of them. Cidolas sacrificed herself to keep me alive after I passed out in my fight with an enemy of mine, and I can only imagine she drove him off, but wasn’t able to save the other Hero. And as for Maria…” He sighed and sat back on the faded yellow desert motorcycle he had been riding. “It’s a long story. Come on.” “C-Cidolas is…? Damn… Damn it!” Vik did not refuse the offer to ride with Silverius, though he stumbled and looked around in a daze as he sat on the back of the vehicle’s seat. “Where are you going?” The mercenary paused at the mention of the question he had spent his life avoiding. “…Do you have any place in mind?” “I do, actually,” Vik said with a furrowing brow. Now that he was gathering his senses outside the context of despair, the events that had taken place in the Mirage Tower were returning to him with as much momentum and power as the Lance Knight themselves. “That light,” he whispered, “It was going to the west. We have to go west.” “Light?” Silverius looked back with a frown. “That huge lightning strike a few hours ago? Why would we be going there?” “Lightning? That wasn’t lightning. The Lance Knight caused it, and I’m sure Ouroboros did this all for a reason. We can’t afford not to investigate and stop him.” Silverius looked at Vik with surprised, widened eyes before turning around with a slight nod and bringing the motorcycle to life with a disruptive roar. “Fill me in on all the details as we ride,” he said, slowly revving the engine of the vehicle to kinetic movement. The mercenary listened and rode with a clenched jaw, at once glad that his comrade had not died and that his chances of saving the rogue Maria were still reasonable. ‘I can save them all.’ ***** Vainia stood up from Taoris’ smoking pseudo-corpse, shakingly confident in her chains’ ability to protect him. She took from his smile that he was still alive, somehow, and was able to take solace in the fac that he could regenerate over time. After all, he had taken a lethal blow at the Black Pass, and had been almost unharmed hours later. He would be able to make it past this trauma as long as he was still alive now. ‘Right?’ As she looked up, the princess of Mortis could see that the rest of the city had not been so lucky. Charlie and Santus were unquestionably dead. The gore that had been scattered amongst the room, along with most of the marble and wood that held up city hall, had been disintegrated. The building as a whole was little more than smoking ash and stone, and the skeletons of two men were scattered on the ground where Charlie and Santus stood just minutes before. Vainia walked past them, eyes closed and hands shaking. Silently, she said a prayer for them in her native Refined High Mortisian. “Nachtiubre,” she whispered as she looked away from their charred, animated skeletons, feeling her stomach turn just from being in the presence of such ruination. “What was that? Such a weapon… I’ve never seen anything like it.” She looked around, shaking and aching. Now that her heartbeat was slowing slightly, Vainia realized that she was mildly burned on her arms and legs, though the damage was not enough to cripple her. As she cringed and examined the damage on her body, Vainia realized that the city was quiet. Gone were the sounds of war and rebellion. No more yelling, no more gunshots or echoing clashes of swords; in the aftermath of the ray of light, there was only stunned silence, apparently throughout the entire city. Vainia’s eyes widened and, thinking of nothing else, she started to run out of the collapsed city hall. ‘My army!’ The tall marble administration building had been built on a small hill. As Vainia ran through the fallen walls and blocks of destroyed stone that had once housed her goals, this very hill kept her from seeing the immediate outside world. She was able to see, though, that the city’s government building was not the only structure to be ruined by the mysterious light attck from the skies. If anything, Vainia reasoned, it looked as if exactly half the city had been torn to charred pieces. Starting from shortly ahead of city hall, the entire part of the city that lie behind her and beyond to the coastline was as ruined as city hall was. Massive wafts of smoke and stone burned an ash gray decorated the otherwise bright day, so much so that even the sky was stained a disgusting, dirty silver. The contrast was like that of night and day. She turned one way and saw a city stunned in silence, alive and bright even past the dark, ominous clouds that still gathered in the horizon and choked the life from the sky. When she turned the other way and looked behind, she saw devastation and silent tragedy, without survivors and barely with ruin to show for it. Still the clouds held light from shining on this part of the world, oppressively, but their efforts were only reinforced by a slowly rising cloud of somber, agonizing darkness. Then Vainia turned back, and saw the people. Miraculously, almost all of the Fifth Brine army had been pushed back from the front steps of city hall in their battle; if they hadn’t, she knew they would have all disintegrated like Santus and young Charlie. As it were, the corpses of Inusian soldiers and random Shorican rebels lay scattered about the wide main street, most of them with flesh rend from their bones. None had survived the cosmic onslaught, something she could attribute to a perverse sort of mercy. All those who had survived, Inusian and Shorican both, stood around the very visible border between normal cobblestone and its charred counterpart. The difference between the part of the city that had been ruined and the part that was unscathed was very obviously clear, and all of them stood around the border, unable to step over but unable to tear their eyes away from the unexplainable slaughter in front of them. When the mixed multitude saw Vainia step out of the smoking ruins of city hall – unscathed, unburned, and unbroken – they screamed. The princess started walking towards the multitude, breathlessly and with her mouth wide open. Her wide, shocked eyes took in all of the landscape around her, greedily remembering the chaos and burning it to her retinas. Broken bodies lay thrown about, some hidden beneath rubble and others plastered onto buildings or the streets. Most bodies had all of their skin and muscle radiantly flayed off their bones, but those who were not so lucky were unrecognizable messes of splayed organs and paintings of blood around them. When she left she had shed the cloak that was over her shoulders, so now she was just in her dirty Zeta Academy uniform of a slate gray blouse, a navy skirt, plain brown loafers, and charred black stockings. Even fully clothed, Vainia shivered as she walked on, slowly, and felt naked by the disgusting display at work around her. She walked onward, staring at the crowd and struggling to hold her breath. Around her, the streets darkened, the buildings collapsed, and she swore she could see life rising and evaporating from the sidewalk’s asphalt. The crowd’s fearful cries quieted as Vainia moved forward, almost at the same slow rate of her steps. For a long part of her long walk, they simply moaned and wordlessly cried aloud. The sorrowful sound was oppressive and took hold of Vainia’s throat. Like a risen dead family member, she walked onto those who thoughtlessly memorialized her, clinging to life and refusing to lie down in the ashes once again. The funeral wails died out too when Vainia grew close to the massive, ash-covered crowd, and before long they were completely silent. As the princess arrived close to the border of destruction, all of the survivors backed away from her, crying out and screaming without words, their mouths and eyes open wide in alarm and fear. Vainia halted at the borderline of destruction. She closed her mouth and took a swallow as she looked onto the multitude, a frightened melting pot of Inusian soldier, Shorican rebel, and Shorican civilian. They were united in the tragedy, she realized late, all taking the place of one people beneath their fear and confusion. ‘This… this is exactly what I need. They are one, and they are weak.’ She swallowed again and raised her chin, swelling up her chin with a large intake of breath, and spoke with a booming voice. “We are alive!” she screamed, looking around wildly at the crowd. “You, me,” she continued, “We are all alive!” The sea of death escapees paused, all of them hooked on her words and no longer shifting and edging away from her. Now they stood, a wall of barely alive refugees, standing steadfast to counter her, singular and powerful. Seeing that no one was contesting her speech, nor were they ignoring her, Vainia went on. “I am Vainia Sestrum, of Fifth Brine. As I look at you all, I see survivors. Brave, noble, warrior survivors! Whether you are Inusian or Shorican – soldier or civilian or Fifth Brine – you are alive. We are alive, and our enemies are dead! Everyone in city hall, every Inusian leader and government official is dead. Every remnant of Phenician authority that was imprisoned there has been killed, just as your brothers and sisters and comrades behind me have been! Every attendant, every intern, every brick have all been ripped apart and strewn to pieces! Even Lord Santus, beloved leader to us all within Fifth Brine, has been killed! I saw him, moments before the strike from the sky came to destroy us, and he spoke to me. We knew what was coming, and he turned to me and said –” Vainia took this moment to pause, holding her fist over her mouth and summoning tears to her eyes. When she spoke again, her voice was equally as loud, but it was shaky and wounded. “He said that we have to stay alive! Not just I, not just the operatives of Fifth Brine; we! All of the people who have seen destruction! All of us who have seen this horrible ruin and lived to look at it with despair – our departed Lord wanted us to live!” She paused, panting, and allowed the crowd a moment of murmuring and internal assent. She heard movement and before her eyes the crowd only grew denser, as if all of the city heard her breaking the deathly silence of Phenicks and had come to listen. She felt somehow blessed that the crowd still listened to her speak without any heckling or resistance, and that they were even invested in what she had to say. Vainia took another deep breath before continuing once again, this time speaking faster and with more spirit, determined to grab onto her growing crowd and hold their attention. “We have a duty ahead of us, friends. We have a duty to live. I will let you in on a secret, something that may shock you. This attack was an unexplainable feat of the heavens, but its direction was no coincidence. In case you don’t remember the fine details of our trauma, I will remind you that the massive attack came from the east. And what lies to the east, friends? What else but Inusia, oppressive empire and ever-choking entity of imperialism? Do you think it is mere coincidence that the cosmic attack came from the skies of Inusia and struck down the center of Phenician government, halting any of our attempts to defend our nation? Have you already been fooled, retrospectively, by the canon and thought that Inusia builds within us all from birth? I see you all in the crowd, and I do not miss those of you who are bluecoats. You are not any different! More Inusian corpses lie behind me in this street than any other Shoricans, and though the rest of the city behind me is undoubtedly decorated with the remains of innocent Phenicians, I know you all did not condone such wanton slaughter! I know all of you have more heart and more intellect than to ever attempt such tragedy, yet you were attacked all the same, just as the Shoricans besides you! So I do not hate you, innocent Inusians. I pity and sympathize for you just as I do with all of my fellow Shorican rebels and civilians, and I beseech you all as one: Be consumed with truth! “We have a duty to live, all of us, and we must the burning power of our livelihood in direct defiance of the heavens that attempted to suppress us! Look behind me, all of you, and see the city of ash and corpses! Our old world has been torn down, burned to ash, and dashed to pieces! Crushed and shattered! Do you dare to think you could ever return to a normal life here? Do you ever think you could peel the corpses out of the rubble and the stones, and just whitewash away their blood and tears? Do you think you can ever bend your knee to the Inusian empire that would wish such a thing upon us all? No! I beg you, say no! Cry out with me in defiance! Let not our continued existence be in vain, and pick yourselves up from the fields beneath us, saturated with death, blood, domintion, subjugation, sorrow, and pain! Even if you do not have the courage, cry out my name! I am Vainia Sestrum of Fifth Brine, and I dream of a free Shorica, free from the oppression of Inusia and the heavens themselves! Dream with me, of our peace, our lives, and our freedom! We must leave behind this city of ruin and flee for now, away from the empire and the antagonistic heavens! For now we retreat, together, in exodus, but soon we will be free! Soon we will have more power than we ever had, all because the heavens tried to crush us! We will defy them! We will live!” Vainia finished triumphantly, pointing her small and clenched fist to an adjacent avenue that led to the west. The crowd cried out thunderously and enthusiastically. All throughout her speech, they had been listening more and more attentively, and slowly cries of enthusiasm and agreement started to build as she talked. Now, once the princess of Mortis and new face of Fifth Brine had ceased her explosive speech of rebirth, the crowd screamed out in attentive agreement, even as they started to quickly file down the avenue that she pointed to. And as they ran, everyone in the crowd screamed her name. “Vainia Sestrum! We will live! Vainia Sestrum!” The ruins of Phenicks rang all through the evening of her name, even after every last member of the multitude rushed each other out of the city of ash. To Vainia’s surprise, the crowd had swelled exponentially over the course of her exclamations, to the point where she was sure that all of Phenick’s surviving population – half of its original 700,000, so around an incredible 350,000 people – had tuned in to her words and decided to live under her word. She waited for them all to leave before running back to city hall. The princess would follow at the rear of the procession, perhaps moving to the front eventually, but first she had someone to save. ***** Vainia met up with the procession of self-exiles a little before they had traveled for a mile, and she pulled a coffin of chainmail behind her. Two tall men came back to meet her as soon as she arrived, and they started to escort her to the front of the procession. As the group walked, Vainia received almost universal fanfare from those paying attention, but the majority of the people in the massive march were either speaking with some near them, dragging friends or family along, or facing forward, absent and retreating within themselves. “I never took you for much of an orator, but I have to say, you’ve proven me wrong.” Both of the men that escorted Vainia to the front of the group, they had revealed upon meeting, were high-ranking veteran officers of Fifth Brine. One was a tall and bulky man with black hair, short on the side of his head but rough on the top; the other was a taciturn blond male, of average height and a tendency to stare at Vainia. “Neither did I,” Vainia admitted, somewhat tired. “But the situation required a solution, and the people required a leader, so I took my natural place.” “This is quite convenient for you,” the raven-haired rebel probed, as if not entirely sure himself if he dared to accuse the new leader of Fifth Brine. Vainia looked up at him with undisguised malice. “As much as it pains me to say so, I did not predict this, I assure you. If I had, I certainly would have worked out a way for me to watch over the chaos without pitting my own life in danger, nor would I have objected myself to this almost miraculous timing.” She licked her lips and jerked on the coffin she dragged behind her, which she pulled with a single thread of silver chains dangling from its lip. “What is your name again?” she added. “Remy Svid,” the man answered. “Don’t worry. I never told you it in the first place.” “You’ll forgive me if I forget it, I hope. Right now a million things are occupying my mind, and they are both noisy and bothersome. You understand, of course.” “Of course, even if Lord Santus made it a point to remember the names of all his subordinates.” “I am not Lord Santus,” Vainia replied, void of all life. “We have noticed. Tell me, Lady Vainia, what will you do if all of Fifth Brine does not consent to your sudden ascension of the burden of leadership? Some even are whispering that it is a usurpation rather than an ascension.” Remy looked straight forward, as if he were a member of the gloomy surviving procession stuck within his own damaged psyche, and spoke again, in his same indecisive tone. “Of course, I don’t follow their beliefs. I’ve only heard it being talked of.” “What quickness you officers discuss things! I have not led you all for two hours and I’m already being suspected. If nothing else, believe my word, Officer Svid – I would not lie about the last words of a noble man. Lord Santus wanted us to live, and he wanted me to lead in his name.” Vainia felt absolutely no shame in fabricating the wishes of a dead man, nor did she believe him noble for a second of her life. “What’s in that coffin?” Now the princess turned to the blond man on the other side of her. He had a familiar stride and voice, but as she could not recognize his face or features, she deemed his identity not an important fact. Still, his calm and quiet presence brought her unease, and his question, asked so randomly that it must have been deliberately done and prepared, only cast more anxiety to Vainia. “My Knight,” she admitted after a long moment of thought and glancing at the blond officer. “He protected me during the attack. He is the only reason I am alive – I could never leave him behind.” “He’s still alive?” Remy frowned and brought a fist over his mouth. “What is that man?” “A Knight sworn to protect my life,” Vainia answered, deciding not to give his name. She looked over to the inquisitive blond once more, but for once he was not looking at her. ‘He must have decided to keep his name to himself, as well.’ She regarded his identity as irrelevant, rightfully, and continued to walk deep in thought and planning. Not long after that the two arrived near the head of the procession, where they saw that most of those walking with a semblance of spirit within them were either Fifth Brine remnants or former Inusian soldiers who had long since shed their blue mantles. Vainia was received positively and enthusiastically by this crowd, and their liveliness reflected back into her and infused the princess with life. As Remy Svid and the silent blond took up walking behind her, Vainia led her army’s exodus further into the west and the gentle, if cold, forests in the Shorican countryside. By now they had abandoned the city limits of Phenicks entirely. They walked on and on, not stopping to rest for hours. Their pace was slow and unmeasured, oftentimes dripping with mourning and sorrow, but on they walked, regardless. When finally they stopped marching, hours later and completely inside the Shorican Wilds, the sun began to dip below the horizon. Its waning painted the sky with variants of bombastic, sublime reds and oranges. Now that she and her followers had hours ago left the city of ashes, the sky had begun to clear up and the sun was at once visible for a few minutes before it was to disapper beneath the earth. Now at the cusp of twilight, the air was aglow with a milky darkness that bordered on midnight blue, accented by aggressive shades of red. Vainia had stood at the border of the sparse forest, directly waving her people onward and motivating them for the final push of the day’s journey. Now that they had all entered the expansive Shorican Wild, she followed somberly with the coffin behind her as always. After following the footprints left behind by the thousands of people she had herded, after a time she arrived at a large clearing, and was led by Remy Svid to an impressive hill overlooking the dip in the earth. On the top of the hill was where the most important Fifth Brine members would be making their camp for the night, and from the vantage point of the hill Vainia could see that the exiled people had circled themselves into the clearing and formed a cohesive camp of their own. She also noticed that they all instinctively looked up to her once she arrived at the lip of the hill, stopping every activity or conversation that had been echoing throughout the dark verdant land. Her very arrival had been enough to silence the entire forest full of thousands of adherents to her words. Vainia had not planned to speak again – but now she felt as if she had no choice. The swelling of pride that multiplied when she saw the instant attention of her followers; the confidence and surety of her position in command of them; the beauty of the world around her; the great sense of satisfaction that her plans were unfolding slowly but surely, and none of the people around her could foil them; all of it filled the princess of Mortis fit to bursting with sublime energy, and she smiled as she took a deep breath. “We are alive!” she exclaimed simply, bringing a collective cry of exultation from the crowd about her and summoning the hushed attention of the camp behind her. When everyone nearby quieted down once again, Vainia continued. “Through the power of our collective power and will to live, we have survived – a feat that should have been impossible! Even those of you who are crippled, weak, sick, tired, or unsure; you’ve all come along on this brave new journey of ours, and you’ve all performed admirably. I know this day will go down in history as the day you were all liberated from your shackles, and your own saviors are yourselves! We have transcended, freed ourselves, and marched right out of our prisons! Tonight, we will mourn those we have lost, and we will mourn for the life we left behind, but more importantly we will rejoice in the life that lies ahead of us all! It is a life of freedom, peace, and power! Again the crowd cheered, longer this time, and again Vainia let them settle down into hushed quiet before she spoke. “I have already asked you for much today, so now I only ask for one simple task. No, it is not even a task, simply a wish of mine – my biggest wish, my most dear dream. I ask you all for your trust! I, Vainia Sestrum, alone walked from the ruins of Phenicks unscathed. I alone wish for the liberation and freedom of all peoples from the tyranny of Inusia and the heavens themselves. I alone was chosen by the lord of Fifth Brine, and I alone stand in his place. I implore you to trust me, and to believe my promises, and to follow my orders! They will be simple and completely beneficial to you; indeed, you will see that I do all in my power for your sake, and for the sake of defeating our enemies! As I said before, in the city of ash, we are one people now! We are united! More than Shoricans, more than Inusians. More than any other people! The rest of the world has not been through the celestial attack that purged Phenicks of its innocence. They will hear of what happened to your city and they will be afraid. They will fear us, and because all the world is still a slave to Inusia, they will hate us and even fight against us. We must not let this hold us back! We must not fear them simply because they are still sheep!” “There is only one outcome the Inusia-centric world will arrive at. If we do not act, they will kill us. If we try to reason with them, they will ignore and kill us. If we try to persuade the world about this injustice, they will silence and kill us. The world is now against us! I hear you, I hear you all moaning and crying out at this state, and I do the same! This hurts us all, but look around at the crying and mourning faces; they are just like yours! Even this has united us, made us stronger! You are restless and tired, I know, but our journey is only beginning! “But how would we go on a journey without a destination, or without a leader? And who could say they are more committed and determined to live freely than I? Is my wish selfish and presumptuous? Perhaps. But is there any other choice? Our only other option would be to not rebel, to not fight, and to be content with our own destruction and ruin. I decry that. I refuse that! It is out of love for you all, and for life, that I refuse to be beaten down, trampled, or made a slave! This determination comes not from inside me, but from the world itself; the heavens; the very skies that left me alive in the face of such scorching death! Look at the stars yourself and see how they are clear, like our path and our future! This world must change, and we must be the ones to change it, and I must be the one to show you the way to liberation! So believe me when I say that I tell you all the truth! More than that – be consumed with my truth! Be reborn with it! “It may be my youth that gives me this arrogance, but it also imbues me with clear vision, and ensures that I am not blind of the chains around my throat! We are all enshackled, and we are all so close to being free! It is out of love for life that I tell you these truths. No one has the right to be oppressed, or killed for their nature and beliefs. No one should live in poverty or neglect! We will live, and we will live equally, without oppression!” Vainia stopped, taking time to relish in the stunned silence reverbating around the forest as she took her breath. She felt sick and drunk with this power, and it was all she could do not to smile and laugh. “We will rest this night,” she continued, just as loud but with less power, “And we will keep moving west. We will not stop until we arrive at Shorekeep, and there we will meet with the last Fifth Brine order and we will take refuge in the city. If the city resists us and our freedom, we will smash the people of oppression onto the rocks that holds them up, and we will create a cosmic tidal wave of change! I ask only for your trust, your stewardship, and your obedience. Know that I will lead you only towards freedom and peace. You do not have to answer me, nor do you have to prove your loyalty to me; I know it to be there, and I feel its strength. There is only one thing I ask you prove to me, one simple task that will determine the rest of your lives. If you refuse this life – if you wish for slavery, oppression, grueling and disrespectful attacks, and a lack of autonomy – walk away from me and my words. Turn back to the city of ashes and rebuild, and return to your life of tyranny and weakness. Go, turn back now! It is your last chance; you will owe me no more!” Not a single person moved. Vainia stood watching the crowd for ten minutes, waiting and watching. Finally, satisfied, she nodded and turned away from the crowd. As she walked towards the camp and out of their vision, the crowd exploded into cries of exultation, love, excitement, and loyalty. She said nothing even as she returned to the small tent that had been set aside as hers. Inside it was only a set of threadbare blankets and the sarcophagus of chains she had brought from Phenicks. As she closed the door of the tent behind her, Vainia let out an exhausted sigh, allowing the heavy burden of power to slip from her chest for the first time that day. She turned around, ready to finally rest. The coffin was now open, and her massive Knight stood over it, his wrapped in the faded blankets. He looked up at her from beneath his brow and smiled. “You’re taking this much farther than even I expected. Such skilled oratory, as well. I’m impressed.” Vainia stood, surprised, and felt her knees buckle a little. Chiefly she was concerned at Taoris’ health; then, she realized, she was at a loss for how Taoris so effortlessly broke through the coffin she had specifically created to be indestructible. “Oh? Have you lost your voice now?” Taoris stepped towards her with a small stride, holding the blankets around his body with his bulging arms. “I was hoping you had a speech prepared for me. Did I dream outside of my boundaries?” Vainia’s only answer at first was to punch Taoris in his broad chest. “You shouldn’t be moving about so freely! If you overextend yourself like this, you’ll actually end up dying!” Taoris tilted his head and smiled at the harmless attack. She wondered if he even felt it. “You, concerned for my health? Embarassing. Don’t bother, my queen, please.” For a moment, though, he looked down and his careless façade faltered. “It doesn’t hurt, not anymore, and my body is all but structurally intact. I can walk, at least.” “You… hurt? But I thought…” “That I was invulnerable? Yes, I thought so to. I don’t remember much from the attack, but immediately after that light hit, I have just a second of memory before I blacked out. In that one instant, I felt more pain than I ever have in my entire life. It was…” Taoris closed his mouth and clenched his jaw, too bothered and disturbed to finish describing his ordeal. Vainia looked up to him with her big, powerful green eyes, and though he avoided making eye contact with her, she could still see the anguish visible on his face. She remembered for a moment the state that Taoris had been in when the light faded from sight. Most of Taoris’ skin and muscle had been melted off; his bones had been charred; she knew there must have been injuries beneath the parts of him that her chains covered, as well. Vainia shivered instinctively at the very thought of such a horror. Taoris did not wait for her to comment, and he probably did not want to speak on the topic any longer than was necessary. “I don’t foresee something like that happening again, though, so you have no reason to doubt my abilities. I will not fail you.” He crossed his arms and looked out towards the door flap of the tent. “What happened to Santus? What is our next move?” Vainia turned away without emotion and sat on the floor with her thick legs crossed. “They died in the attack. You and I were the only survivors. I’m the leader now.” “The perfect chance for you to rise up as leader, and you took it effortlessly. I’m beginning to see that I can expect only the best from my queen.” Taoris nodded in satisfaction. “Next I will take Shorekeep,” Vainia added, unaffected by his compliment. “Then I will speak to the whole of Shorica and hold the entire country. I will have my city and my army.” Taoris nodded again, but said nothing. “I have predicted a plan; Inusia will attack before it will finish and before I have the entire nation, most likely. Between you, me, and my army, we will survive, and before long I will have other nations fighting against the empire, as well.” “I see… Even then, you will fight under Shorica’s name and with Shorica’s army. It’s relatively risk-free for Mortis… as long as Inusia doesn’t find out you’re the princess, of course.” “You misunderstand me. My home nation is already crippled by poverty and a worthless economy. The only way Inusia could strike it down would be an outright war, but that would be a waste of the resources they’ll need to stop me here. There’s no point in hiding my identity. My parents will cast away my name regardless… they’re dogs of Inusia, obedient to the will of the empire even though it weakens us.” One look and Taoris was able to see the disgust and disappointment in Vainia’s face. He made a note not to bring up the girl’s parents very often. “Very well. Did you mean all of what you said out there, about peace and equality?” The wild-haired man smiled derisively, and Vainia could not help but smile as well. “Of course I did, though not in the way they envision. In my final, perfect world, there will be no more poverty, injustice, or subjugation; only my authority. There will be no righteousness until I fix this disgusting, corrupt world myself. That is impossible without war, and war is unwinnable without death. Many will die, I’m sure, but I will still succeed.” Vainia looked down at her hands, both of them clasped into small fists, and for a moment her eyes flickered with pure hatred and determination. Taoris nodded once again, satisfied with this as he was with all the other answers. Slowly he laid himself in the coffin he had opened, face up and covered in most of the blankets in the room. “I’ve never been more right than when I decided to spare your life,” his voice echoed out from within the chainmail coffin. Vainia could not tell if she should be flattered or flustered. She removed the ponytail holding her hair in place, allowing her long and straight chestnut hair to fall over her shoulders and back elegantly. After some time in thought she spoke, knowing that Taoris was still awake. “I have a separate plan for us,” she said, quietly but firmly. “The army will march west to Shorekeep, but at the next port I will go south, to Mortis. Thinking of my parents earlier, I remembered that they are scheduled to be out of the country now, for a meeting with all the world powers. This timing is perfect… and I will use it to take some ships from Mortis, as many as I can command. It will aid in the conquest and defense of the city.” “And I?” Taoris asked. “You will go ahead of me and the multitude, to Fifth Brine’s office in Shorica. With your speed, you can get there much faster than these thousands can, and if we already have the support of Fifth Brine from the inside, sacking the city will be much easier. I’m confident that the mob will get to Shorekeep just fine; a few hundred may desert, but the vast majority of them are completely enamored with me, and they will perservere.” “Such speed… I will just barely be healed enough for that tomorrow, and even then it will weaken me. I might not be able to fight well in the conquest of the city.” “Then your mission of taking Fifth Brine is even more important. If you succeed there, there will be no need to fight. It will be difficult, but I know you will succeed.” She could not see Taoris from within the coffin, but she could sense how uncomfortable he was by his silence. “So much faith in me,” he finally answered. “Why? How do you know I won’t betray you, or that I’ll do what you say? Why do you trust me so? Even Santus did not trust me as much as you do… and we fought together for years, back when we were still children without hair on our chests.” “Do I have a reason not to trust you?” Vainia’s Knight said nothing. “You’ve saved my life twice now. There have been countless opportunities for you to bathe in my blood, and you’ve taken none of them. You’ve not failed me yet, and I know you won’t fail me at all. If anything, you’re the one I trust most in this world besides myself.” There was a long pause before Taoris spoke again, so long that Vainia found herself shocked awake from a light slumber when he finally did talk. He whispered, just barely loud enough for her to hear, and she was not even sure if he knew she was not asleep. “I loved to tell my children a story of a beautiful and noble bird trapped in its egg. It grew from infancy to adulthood within its egg and was never able to break out. Even when it grew wings, they were stunted, depraved, and deformed from being within the egg for so long. It was born with instincts and dreams of flying, but the years of being stuck in its egg left the bird with ambitions of nothing but death. In the end it craved death, yearned for it, and felt it coming within its bones. But suddenly the egg cracked and fell apart, and staring down at the bird was a massive old snake, its fierce fangs ready to tear the bird apart. In exultation, the bird stretched its wings out and rejoiced at death, which came with its freedom… but the snake did not bite. It couldn’t. The bird was too magnificent, too beautiful and rare… so the snake retreated, afraid of the resplendent and freed creature. The bird flew away soon after and the snake followed; from that day until the day the bird died, the snake protected and loved the bird from afar, even as the bird’s wings shone like galaxies. The jaded old snake saw a whole new world there, in the reflection from the bird’s wings… Maybe in your new world, I will find…” Vainia sat in stunned silence for another long pause. She looked down at her hands, unsure of how to take her Knight’s story or the revelation that he had children. Had. She couldn’t imagine such a man having children or taking care of a family. Were they still alive? Had he abandoned them? Did Santus know anything? For the first time, she cursed the man for having died so quickly, and wished she had taken more time to inquire on Taoris’ origins. A deep sadness for her Knight soon replaced that regret. “I will take you with me,” Vainia finally whispered, unsure of whether or not Gin Taoris could hear her. “You will learn to fly with me.” Having said this, she laid down and slept, her mind turbulent and restless with layers of thought and sorrow. ...End of Part Twenty-One. <- Previous Page | Main Page | Next Page ->